was dying. May I just have one more look at her? I will not speak; I will hardly breathe. Only let me see her once again!”
“I beg your pardon, sir, but I don’t know who you are; and if you mean Miss Wilkins, by ‘her,’ she is very ill, but we hope not dying. She was very ill, indeed, yesterday; very dangerously ill, I may say, but she is having a good sleep, in consequence of a soporific medicine, and we are really beginning to hope”
But just here Miss Monro’s hand was taken, and, to her infinite surprise, was kissed before she could remember how improper such behaviour was.
“God bless you, madam, for saying so. But if she sleeps, will you let me see her? it can do no harm, for I will tread as if on egg shells; and I have come so far—if I might just look on her sweet face. Pray, madam, let me just have one sight of her. I will not ask for more.”
But he did ask for more after he had had his wish. He stole upstairs after Miss Monro, who looked round reproachfully at him if even a nightingale sang, or an owl hooted in the trees outside the open windows, yet who paused to say herself, outside Mr. Wilkins’s chamber door,
“Her father’s room; he has not been in bed for six nights, till to-night; pray do not make a noise to
